Today — right on the edge — wave, wind and visibility.
Sources & confidence
Compiled by the spearo sea-state engine · How it works →
The verdict comes from seven water factors and hard safety gates — not ten tabs. Go or stay.
Our own model
Our own forecast engine — not a third-party widget. It weighs these water factors into one go-or-stay verdict for this coast; the 0–10 dial is that verdict, read out as a number.
Safety gates
It all folds into a single 0–10 score and one verdict: go or stay.
A forecast, not a guarantee — the sea has the last word.
Where to get in, where to hunt
Wind, wave and the swell windows — when to go and the best hours.
The day is picked above, in the hero. Here are that day's windows, the hour-by-hour map and the trends. Tap a window to break down the conditions.
Leave your email — and the moment a window opens at Kelleys Island, we'll send the go / no-go verdict. Email is all we need.
What's missing? Tell us what you'd like to see — new spots, species, data or features. We read everything.
Visibility and what drives it — post-storm clearing, river plume, temperature and the thermocline.
spearo.app folds wind, wave, swell period, visibility, tides, water temperature and risk into a single verdict — go to the spot or not. It computes 7 days ahead from open marine models (Open-Meteo, IPMA), with no sign-up and no accounts. Built for solo spearfishing off the rocks, where any mistake costs dearly.
Now live: 3016 spots across 406 stretches of coast — mainland Portugal, Madeira and the Azores.
See all spotsRelief and bottom type, tides, and the depths of each spot.
The models set the window. Whether you go in is read only at the water: count the sets, watch the surge on the entry. If in doubt, you don't get in.
Scouted entries, coloured by today. The colour is the sea state at the spot, not a guarantee: the wash and a slippery entry you judge on site.
Open the seafloor mapThe full spot briefing is part of the subscription: entry, bottom, hazards, tide window.
Open in the appCharles Herndon Sculpture Garden is a lake shore entry about 2.7 km from Kelleys Island. Mapped by OpenStreetMap as a waterfront park. The shore here faces Lake Erie. Check the state's current spearing rules before you dive.
Google MapsShore access to the lake at Inscription Rock Petroglyphs, 0.4 km out of Kelleys Island. From here you swim out into Lake Erie. Marker position: 41.593° N, 82.707° W. Fresh water: carry less lead than in the sea. Check the state's current spearing rules before you dive.
Google MapsShoal off the north-east corner of Kelleys Island, about 4-5 m over flat limestone. The same glacially grooved rock you see on shore continues underwater here. Exposed to the north; boat only.
Google MapsKelleys Island State Park Public Beach: you walk into the lake from the shore, 2.9 km from Kelleys Island. The shore here faces Lake Erie. Coordinates of the entry: 41.615 N, 82.704 W. State fishing rules set species and seasons for spearing; check them first.
Google MapsThe rocky east point of Kelleys Island, where the limestone shelf runs out under 1-3 m of water. A rare shore entry on Lake Erie - walk in from the state-park side; snorkelling depth, and blown out by any east wind.
Google MapsShore access to the lake at North Pond Barrier Beach, 2.6 km out of Kelleys Island. Access type in the OpenStreetMap data: beach. From here you swim out into Lake Erie. Coordinates of the entry: 41.612 N, 82.700 W. Check the state's current spearing rules before you dive.
Google MapsThe full spot briefing is part of the subscription: entry, bottom, hazards, tide window.
Open in the appSOLO is the biggest risk: underwater you can black out from lack of oxygen silently and fatally, with no one around. Solo is never truly «safe». Below are the best weather windows; carry a buoy, tell someone your plan and exit time, and any doubt — don't go.
Cameras, map and reference — to hand as you come up.
Check the cam BEFORE you leave. Foam, brown/green murk, or waves washing the entry rocks = No-go. At night/in fog the cam is useless — treat it as «unknown», NOT «green».
Kelleys Island gives you what most of Lake Erie does not: hard limestone bottom, reasonable clarity and a shore entry. Ohio's rule for spearfishing is read off a class — forage fish, meaning freshwater drum, common carp, the Asian carps, quillback, suckers, bowfin, gar, buffalo, gizzard shad and goldfish, may be taken by any method except a list that omits spears. Game fish are treated as closed, because Ohio publishes nothing allowing them by spear and the administrative code that would settle it could not be read. Ferry from Marblehead; the shoals sit in 3-5 m with current in South Passage.
Four sites, all shallow, all on limestone. Long Point is the one you can walk into; the three shoals are short boat runs, and the two in South Passage carry current that keeps them cleaner than the surrounding basin. Legal status is identical on every row: forage fish by any method including a spear, game fish treated as closed pending the unread Ohio code.
| Spot | Type | Depth | Level | Access | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Long Point | Rock | 0.5-3 m | Snorkel to single tank · forage fish only, game fish closed | Walk-in from the state-park side | The rocky east point of the island, where the limestone shelf runs out under 1-3 m of water. A rare shore entry on Lake Erie; snorkelling depth, and blown out by any east wind. |
| Kelleys Island Shoal | Reef | 2.5-4.5 m |
US spearfishing law is state-by-state. License, spearable species, powerhead rules and distances vary; federal sanctuaries (Gray's Reef, the Keys, Flower Garden Banks) ban spearfishing. Always confirm with the state agency and local ordinances.
| Snorkel to single tank · forage fish only, game fish closed |
| Boat |
| Shoal off the north-east corner of the island, about 4-5 m over flat limestone. The same glacially grooved rock you see on shore continues underwater here. Exposed to the north; boat only. |
| American Eagle Shoal | Reef | 3-5.1 m | Boat, current · forage fish only, game fish closed | Boat | Limestone shoal west of the island in about 5 m, named on the USGS gazetteer and charted as a hazard. Hard bottom with ledges, moderate current in South Passage. |
| South Shoal | Reef | 3-5 m | Boat, current · forage fish only, game fish closed | Boat | Rock shoal in South Passage between Kelleys and Catawba, roughly 5 m. Steady current through the passage keeps it cleaner than the surrounding basin; ferry and pleasure traffic is constant. |
For forage fish, yes. The Ohio Division of Wildlife defines forage fish as freshwater drum (sheepshead), common carp, grass carp in waters not stocked by the Division for vegetation control as posted, bighead carp, silver carp, black carp, quillback, suckers, bowfin, gar, buffalo, gizzard shad and goldfish, and states that these species may be taken by any method except by means of explosives, poisons, firearms, electricity, chemicals, nets other than cast nets, seines, traps, or by snagging within 1,000 feet downstream of a posted dam. Spears, gigs and bows are absent from that exception list, so a spear is a lawful method for forage fish in Ohio waters of Lake Erie. Ohio never uses the word spearfishing anywhere in its Lake Erie regulations, which is why the answer has to be read this way.
Ohio publishes no statewide sentence limiting game fish to angling. The closest thing in print is the Pymatuning entry, which allows only angling except carp and suckers by longbow and arrow or spears — and Pymatuning is a border lake, not Lake Erie. Ohio Administrative Code 1501:31-13 would settle the question and could not be opened; codes.ohio.gov refused every connection during this research. So the statement that game fish may not be speared in Ohio is an inference, and it ships unverified. Act on it anyway: treat smallmouth bass, walleye, yellow perch and the salmonids as closed to the spear here, and confirm with ODNR if you intend to do otherwise. Three gars — alligator, shortnose and spotted — are Ohio state endangered even though gar is a forage-fish category, so identify before you shoot. Lake sturgeon, shovelnose sturgeon, cisco, longnose sucker and goldeye are possession-prohibited in all Ohio waters.
Kelleys Island is the biggest American island in the lake and it is essentially one slab of limestone. Ashore you can see abandoned quarries and the famous glacial grooves; the same rock carries on under the surface, which is why the diving here has structure at all. Kelleys Island Shoal, off the north-east corner in about 4-5 m of flat limestone, is where that grooved rock continues underwater. American Eagle Shoal, west of the island in about 5 m, is charted as a hazard and has hard bottom with ledges. South Shoal sits in the passage between Kelleys and Catawba in roughly 5 m. And Long Point, the island's rocky east point, is one of the few places on the whole of Lake Erie where the limestone shelf runs out under 1-3 m of water within a walk-in from the state-park side.
South Passage is the feature to plan around. The steady current through it keeps South Shoal cleaner than the surrounding basin, and American Eagle Shoal has moderate current for the same reason — that is the upside. The downside is that ferry and pleasure traffic through the passage is constant, so a diver-down flag is mandatory and a live boat is the sensible arrangement. Wind is the other limit: Kelleys Island Shoal is exposed to the north, and Long Point is blown out by any east wind. On the western basin generally, visibility collapses after wind over about 15 knots, so the difference between an excellent day and a wasted trip here is a settled forecast.
Ice cover on Lake Erie often reaches 90-100 % in February. The season runs May to October and this lake warms first, up to 22-24 °C in August — at 1-5 m depths that means a thin wetsuit is genuinely enough in late summer, which is not true anywhere else on the Great Lakes. There is no tide; the Great Lakes astronomical range is a few centimetres and NOAA publishes no predictions for these stations. The nearest CO-OPS gauge is Marblehead, 9063079, about 5.5 km away, and the ferry to the island runs from the same place. Ohio licences from the 2025-26 digest, valid through 28 February 2026 and worth re-verifying: resident 1-year $25.00, non-resident 1-year $50.96, non-resident 3-day $25.00, 1-day $14.00.
For forage fish, yes: drum, carp, the Asian carps, quillback, suckers, bowfin, gar, buffalo, gizzard shad and goldfish. Spears are not among Ohio's prohibited means for that class.
No. Treat game fish as closed. Ohio publishes nothing allowing them by spear and OAC 1501:31-13 could not be read; confirm with ODNR.
Long Point on the east side, where the limestone shelf runs out under 1-3 m of water. Walk in from the state-park side; any east wind closes it.
Kelleys Island Shoal about 4-5 m, American Eagle Shoal about 5 m, South Shoal roughly 5 m. All boat access.
Limestone bottom instead of the western basin's soft mud, plus steady current through South Passage that keeps South Shoal cleaner than the surrounding water.
By ferry from Marblehead, where the NOAA gauge also sits, about 5.5 km away.
Up to 22-24 °C in August. Ice cover often reaches 90-100 % in February and the season runs May to October.
Yes. Alligator, shortnose and spotted gar are Ohio state endangered even though gar as a category is a forage fish.
